Her Goodbye
790 Words
Lilith could not feel her legs. Her entire body felt numb and her vision began to blur.
She heard a thud. Then felt the cold floorboard against her cheek.
She heard the King barking out commands in the background.
Then everything went blank.
***
Lilith groaned. There was something cold pressed against her forehead. She tried to swat it away, but it kept coming back.
"Tell the King she is awake." She heard someone say.
She opened her eyes slightly.
The royal doctor looked down at her and her lady's maid, standing at the corner, with a look of concern.
"Ah."
Was that creaky sound her voice?
"Water." The doctor ordered.
She felt a lot better when she sat up and drank.
"Do you know what happened to you, Your Majesty?" the royal doctor asked.
Lilith tried to nod. She didn't want to speak.
"Fortunately, no injuries were sustained. You need rest now. I shall see the King now and leave you be."
Lilith watched him leave her chamber.
She ordered everyone out.
Then she curled into her bed and sobbed.
Some time later, she didn't know how long, someone came in.
"Leave me be." She murmured.
“It is I, dear.”
Lilith froze at the sound of her mother's voice.
“Mother.” She chided with teary eyes.
“I–I—."
She felt the Queen's warm embrace and started sobbing all over again.
“It will be fine, dear.” The Queen replied, her voice tinged with melancholy.
“But how…? How when he will be my husband? I do not want to be married to him. There are others... that have asked for my hand, is that not so?”
Her mom said nothing but continued to pat her back.
“No suitor would want to take what the King of Ravar has set his eyes on… and… you should look at the brighter side, dear. You will become a queen.”
Lilith shook her head, thinking;
How can she not understand?
How can she not get me?
Fiercely, she said: "I do not want to be his queen, mother!"
“You have no choice in that matter!” Her mother shouted, startling her.
She almost never raised her voice. Not to Lilith.
She continues with a softer tone.
“None of us do, dear. We do not have a say in things like this—"
The chamber doors swung open, the King at the doorframe.
The queen bowed, and Lilith looked away.
“Leave. I wish to speak to the Princess.”
He said it like he was not talking to his wife.
Was that how her marriage would be?
To bear children and then abandoned?
Her mother squeezed her hand and left, closing the chamber doors behind her.
"The doctor said you are well."
Lilith remained silent, her gaze still elsewhere.
“Fit for a journey.” That was what caught her attention. “To Ravar, of course.”
Lilith met his gaze with wide, pleading eyes.
“Father—”
"Not a word! I heard your outrageous discussion with your mother. I want none of that. Like she said…we do not have a choice. It's either you…or our entire Kingdom. This decision is for the betterment of Handale."
He said it. All those years, she'd known.
The kingdom came before his family.
It always did.
“By some wonder…he seems to hold you in a high regard. Promised to take good care of you.” He looks her dead in the eye as he says; “You will be happy.”
But there was uncertainty in his voice.
Lilith bit her lips to stop herself from breaking into a sob just there.
She stared at the man she called her Father until her vision blurred.
Hot tears rolled down her cheek, hate lodged in her chest. She called herself a Princess yet she'd been sold off in one afternoon. To a beast, at that.
“You will begin preparations at once. There will be no ceremony. The scrolls shall be signed tomorrow.”
She heard him leave her chamber without another word.
Marriages were almost always purely political, especially amongst nobles. Lilith almost laughed out loud at the turn of her day. One moment, she was out for a walk; the next, she was engaged to a barbarian King. That was what servants referred to him as; a savage.
She had heard several stories about him. None good.
What would it be like, married to the infamous Ruthless King?
Lilith did not want to find out.
But one question kept intruding her thoughts; How powerful was this man that he demanded a bride and had her the very next day?
- Writer
